by Richard Bard
When he pushed through the double doors at the end of the corridor, the music and energy from the scene washed over him, pulling him backward in time to the grand halls of sixteenth-century Venice.
Jake stood on a second-floor balcony encircling a gymnasium-sized courtyard that had been converted into an extravagant ballroom. Two immense seven-tier crystal chandeliers hung on thick cords from a steel-framed skylight three stories above. Hundreds of teardrop-shaped bulbs flickered as simulated candlelight, casting a warm glow over the gathering.
He found himself amidst a throng of masked characters dressed in richly colored costumes of incredible variety and detail. It was as if he’d walked into the middle of an epic Hollywood production.
There were upper-crust lords and ladies, dashing noblemen, sparkling gypsies, and sexy courtesans. An Arab sheik, in a scarlet floor-length mantle and bulbous pearl-laden turban, sipped champagne with a delicate princess dressed in layer upon layer of pink lace that was so sheer as to permit the discerning eye to drink in the outline of her inviting curves. A court jester danced with a queen, and a pagan priestess walked arm in arm with a red-cloaked cardinal. And most everyone wore hand-painted leather or papier-mâché masks depicting a vast range of caricatures: Elizabethan actors, faces from the underworld, the sinister white beaks of the plague doctors, cats, warlords, and even Hansel and Gretel dressed in lederhosen.
More guests stood on the third-story balcony above him, chatting, sipping drinks, or just leaning over the columned balustrade to soak in the music and the enchanting scene below. One couple had lifted their masks for a lingering kiss in the shadows, succumbing to the wanton spirit that seemed to permeate the atmosphere.
The masks in the room were a double-edged sword. The people wearing them couldn’t recognize him, or so he hoped. But likewise, he couldn’t tell whether anyone was paying him any particular attention. It was impossible to know for sure. The alarm could sound at any moment, if it hadn’t already, so he had to get out quickly. He fought the urge to rush toward an exit. First he needed to study the layout to be certain of the best avenue for escape.
Before him a grand staircase curved down and spilled onto the dance floor below. Thick walnut handrails supported by gilded swirls of decorative wrought-iron stanchions followed the widening steps. A twelve-piece orchestra dressed in gold costumes with white ruffles and powdered wigs played a tarantella from a raised platform in the far corner of the hall. The dance floor was packed.
Jake marked the palace’s main entrance at the north end of the room. Through the wide arched opening, he caught a glimpse of lights reflecting off the rippling surface of the canal just outside. He saw couples being assisted out of their gondolas as they pulled up to the landing, eager to join the festivities. Guests were corralled through metal detectors like the ones used at airports. Purses and bags were searched. One woman, dressed in a wide hoop skirt, was pulled aside as one of the guards seemed to consider the proper way to run a wand down her legs.
The same routine was being followed at a smaller entrance at the east end of the room. That would be his way out.
There were three guards at the entrance, dressed in the blue-, gold-, and red-striped tunics of the Swiss Guard, like those that protected the Vatican in Rome. It appeared as if their primary focus was on those entering the palace. They paid little attention to the few who were leaving.
Jake started down the stairs, thankful for his half-mask, tipping his tricorne to other guests as they walked by.
He turned right at the bottom of the stairs, hugging the perimeter of the room. As he neared the exit, a new group of guests crowded into the doorway. Two ladies moved forward, handing their decorative clutches to the guards. The third guard was checking names off the guest list, temporarily distracted.
Jake quickened his pace.
Four more strides and he’d be out.
Jake?
He hesitated when he heard Francesca’s voice in his head, which sparked a surge of adrenaline deep in his chest.
Jake, are you here?
With a fleeting glance at the exit, he turned back around, calling for her with his mind. Francesca?
There were costumed faces everywhere.
Francesca called out again, her thoughts anxious. Jake, where are you?
He probed the expansive room with his mind and sensed she was somewhere above him.
He shouldered his way toward the center of the ballroom so he could scan the full perimeter of both balconies. Dozens of masked faces with colorful but static expressions seemed to be looking in his direction. She could be any one of them.
Steadying himself, he closed his eyes. He sorted through the jumbled waves of emotions that drifted toward him, feeling for her. He filtered out the music and then the chatter, searching for the resonance that he knew was Francesca.
He felt her. There. Above his left shoulder.
Jake swiveled his head and opened his eyes.
The half-second that it took to recognize her seemed to stretch while Jake soaked in her image.
She looked as if she’d stepped out of Cinderella’s fairy tale, paused midway down the staircase, her delicate white-gloved hand caressing the rail. She wore an off-shoulder, white silk gown with a tight bodice that lifted the soft curves of her breasts, hugged her small waist, and then billowed to the floor. Her upswept hair supported a sparkling tiara and revealed the swanlike contours of her slender neck. Her eye mask was pure white to match her dress, sprinkled with a swirling constellation of reflective sparkles that seemed to gather the light and illuminate her honey brown eyes. There was concern in the depth of those eyes as they searched the crowd.
Jake’s breath deserted him.
Francesca.
Her head turned, and their eyes met. The tension seemed to evaporate from her shoulders, as if an enormous weight had been lifted. Her face lit up with a smile, and she floated down the steps, her pearlescent jeweled slippers peeking out beneath the hem of her gown.
Other masked faces were turned her way as well, though Jake couldn’t tell if it was because of her presence or something else entirely. Was she being used as bait to lure him out?
Jake gave a subtle shake of his head, sending Francesca a warning thought. No eye contact. Follow me.
Francesca’s cheeks flushed a deep pink. She turned her gaze away. Jake walked past her at the bottom of the staircase, close enough to brush up against the folds of her gown. He sensed her hesitate a moment before following him around the corner.
Jake headed toward an alcove behind one of several marble pillars supporting the first-floor balcony, out of view of the crowd. Francesca joined him in the shadows.
Turning so he was not facing her, he said, “It mustn’t appear that we’re speaking to one another. In case you’re being watched.”
Francesca continued to stand casually beside him, her gaze on the pastry table they had just passed.
Jake was desperate to get moving, and he was going to take her with him. Scanning the east exit, he saw another big group of guests lined up, waiting to clear security. That was their cue.
“It’s time to leave,” Jake whispered. “Follow me.”
He was three strides from the exit when Francesca grabbed his wrist from behind. She jerked him into the crowd of dancers, her hushed voice urgent. “We can’t leave. They’re waiting!”
Jake caught the desperation in her voice and followed her movements with the music, hoping to blend in with the other dancers. He looked over her shoulder toward the exit for any sign of trouble. “Who’s waiting? Where?”
Francesca lifted her gloved hand to his cheek, turning his head toward her to capture his eyes. “Jake, look at me. You mustn’t draw their attention. They don’t know how you are dressed and they have no idea that I know you were brought here. So, I am not being watched. However, they know you’ve escaped. I overheard Carlo giving orders to the men. They’re hidden outside each exit, checking everyone who leaves.”
***
Hassan woke on the floor of the converted chapel with a burning pain in his throat. Each gurgling breath was a struggle, requiring a conscious effort to suck air into his collapsed windpipe. Moving slowly, he pushed himself to his feet.
He silently cursed the American. The man had been dressed in the costume that Hassan was to have worn. His use of Dari had distracted him, and the man’s uncanny speed had taken him completely by surprise.
Never before had he been beaten so easily.
Disgusted with himself, Hassan stared into the wall mirror. His nose canted awkwardly to one side, broken. A thick layer of dried blood ran from his nostrils down and around his chin, like a crimson goatee. His neck was bruised purple and yellow and swollen to nearly twice its size. The sight enraged him as he realized he could never complete his mission in America in this condition.
He shoved his way through the chapel door and shuffled down the hallway toward his room, wheezing with each labored step.
After washing his face and combing back his dyed-blond hair, Hassan wrapped a white scarf around his ruined neck. He removed the blue-tinted contact lenses from his eyes and placed them in their cases on the sink. After pulling on the sport coat he was to have worn on the plane the next morning, he reached into his breast pocket and withdrew his forged passport and the one-way first-class ticket to JFK. He dropped them onto the bed; he wouldn’t need those now. His path to paradise was no longer in America. It was downstairs in the ballroom.
He lifted a small aluminum briefcase from the floor of his locker, spun the dials on the twin combination locks, and emptied its contents on the bed: a wrinkled photo of his wife and child, both dead; a worn copy of the Koran; prayer beads; a 7.62-millimeter Tokarev automatic with three spare clips; and two Russian-made F1 antipersonnel grenades.
Picking up the grenades, one in each palm, he caressed their deep ridges with reverence. He closed his eyes, tilted his face toward heaven, ignored the burning pain in his throat, and whispered a prayer to Allah.
Hassan had given his life over to their righteous cause long ago, had embraced the glorious moment of his martyrdom over and over again in his mind. Though his opportunity for striking in America was now gone, he refused to give up his dream. Western decadence was not the exclusive purview of the Americans. It existed throughout the world, even downstairs in this very palazzo, where nonbelievers—many in pagan costumes—reveled in their heathen ritual.
The American was surely among them, dressed in a costume that only Hassan could identify. He considered alerting Battista and his guards, but then this final chance to strike would surely be taken from him. He would not allow that to happen. It was his destiny to kill the American filth and any nonbelievers unfortunate enough to be around him. He would do so in a manner that would not soon be forgotten.
Rolling the grenades in his palms, he smiled, contemplating the look on the American’s face when he realized that death was upon him. The man’s astonishing speed would do nothing to save him from a supersonic blast of red-hot shrapnel. He knew each grenade had a dispersion range of nearly two hundred meters and a kill radius of thirty.
Hassan dropped the grenades in the side pockets of his sport coat and left the room, the heavy bulges knocking against his thighs with each step.
Chapter 24
Venice, Italy
TONY KEPT A WARY EYE as they drifted through the shadows of the narrow canal. He gripped the MP5 under the heavy cape of his musketeer costume. Francesca’s uncle Vincenzo sat next to him wearing his lipsticked mask and much-too-real-looking inflatable bodice as Tony’s date for the ball.
According to Tony’s Swiss Army watch, it was 10:50 p.m., ten minutes until the guards changed shifts. By then they needed to be inside distributing weapons to the rest of the team, who should have already entered in costume through the main entrance.
With a glance over his shoulder, Tony watched Mario rock forward and back on his carpeted perch on the stern, the gondola’s heavy oar handle tracing a figure-eight pattern in the old gondolier’s firm grip.
“Can’t this thing go any faster?” Tony asked.
Small beads of sweat blossomed on the old man’s forehead. He set his jaw and leaned further into each sweep of the oar, the boat teetering side to side with the effort. He said, “Do not worry. We are close. Just around the next corner.”
Tony caught the quiver in his voice, but he also saw the conviction etched across the old man’s weathered features. He was the only one without a mask and costume. Their plan depended on the fact that Mario knew the guard on this shift. He would recognize Mario and open the door. A simple plan. But if anything went wrong, Battista would know Mario was involved.
The old man was risking everything.
Pushing hard with every stroke, Mario said, “It is good that our paths crossed today. You wish to free your friend, and I must expose the truth of the institute in order to save my daughter, no matter the price. We are tied together as brothers in tonight’s events.”
This was a sentiment that Tony understood—brothers in arms against a common enemy. He appreciated the old man’s spirit. “Don’t worry, Mario. We’re gonna make this happen.”
They rounded the final turn and Tony saw the deep shadows of the open-water garage fifty yards ahead. Vincenzo spoke softly into the cell phone mike tucked under his flowing blond wig, checking in with the teams of gondoliers at the other entrances. He stiffened and held up a hand, turning to Mario as he rattled something in Italian.
Mario brought the gondola to a quick stop. He explained to Tony in an anxious voice, “Something is wrong. There are extra guards at each of the other entrances.”
Tony considered their options. “Okay, we gotta figure on extra guards in the garage too. Tell the other teams to hold on. Here’s what we’re gonna do.”
A minute later Mario was once again working the gondola toward the garage, singing a ballad that echoed across the water. Tony had one arm draped romantically around Vincenzo’s neck. In a loud, slurred New York accent, he said, “Come on, baby, just one little kiss, huh?”
Mario stopped rowing just before they reached the entrance. The nose of the gondola drifted into the garage. Tony was boisterous. “Don’t fight me, honey. You know you want it.”
Tony had his big hands all over Vincenzo’s fake bodice, forcing a loud squeak from under the girly mask. Vincenzo fell onto his back, trying to fend off the drunk and bawdy American. Dropping the oar, Mario skirted the struggling couple to retrieve a wooden club from under the front seat. He waved it in the air, shouting at Tony, “Signore, you must not!”
The front of the wobbling gondola clipped the brick perimeter wall within the garage and glided farther inside. The struggle in the bottom of the boat became frantic. Mario shouted, “Signore, stop!”
Brushing aside Mario’s plea, Tony forced his knees down between Vincenzo’s legs.
Vincenzo let out a high-pitched squeal. “Aiuto, aiuto!”
Tony heard the heavy footfalls of the guards moving quickly across the stone landing. A shadow shifted at his side, but Tony kept his back turned, waiting for the right moment, pawing at Vincenzo’s breast. The boat jerked, and its forward progress stopped abruptly. Tony sensed someone hovering over him.
A voice yelled in his ear. “Basta!” The cold tip of a barrel pressed hard into the nape of Tony’s neck.
Tony spun around, grabbed the gunman’s wrist, and yanked hard, leaning back with the effort. The guard yelped as he tumbled head over heels into the boat. His shoulder landed hard on Vincenzo’s inflated left breast and popped it like an overfilled balloon. The man’s pistol spun from his grip and clattered into the footwell.
The struggling guard twisted around and elbowed Vincenzo in the chin. He snapped out with his foot to land a solid kick to Tony’s jaw. Tony reeled bac
kward. The guard lunged for his pistol. Vincenzo threw a hairy forearm around his neck, twisted his head, and yanked him into his chest, the guard’s hands and feet flailing.
A second guard rushed forward, one foot on the dock and the other on the upturned nose of the bow. Tony’s hands worked feverishly to unfold the MP5 from the tangles of his cape. But the guard had already unholstered his pistol and was swinging up the barrel.
It was a race Tony was going to lose.
The guard sneered and flicked off the safety.
Before the man could squeeze off a round, Mario swung his club across the guard’s knee. The crack sounded like a major league home run.
The guard’s face contorted in pain as his leg folded beneath him. He stumbled to the dock, catching himself with one hand while the other brought the pistol around toward Mario’s head.
There were three rapid spits from under Tony’s cape and the guard flew backward onto the dock, three crimson blossoms stitched across his chest.
Tony flipped the cape over his shoulder and spun the silenced muzzle of the MP5 toward the first guard still struggling behind him. The man was on his back, with Vincenzo’s sinewy forearm locked in a death grip around his neck. The guard’s face was beet-red, pressed against Vincenzo’s chest. Mario stepped behind them, his teeth bared, the club cocked in his white-knuckled hand.
Pressing the hot barrel of the MP5 into the guard’s uniformed chest, Tony said, “Release him, slowly.” This whole scenario had just gotten a hell of a lot more complicated, and Tony wanted some answers from this son of a bitch.
Vincenzo loosened his grip.
Gasping in a lungful of air, the guard glared at Tony. There was a blur of movement and Mario’s club smashed into the guard’s temple with a sickening thud.
The guard’s eyes rolled backward, and he sagged into Vincenzo.
Mario growled, “Terrorista.” He spit on the man’s limp body.
Tony checked the guard’s pulse to confirm his suspicion.
Dead.
Tony hiked an eyebrow at Mario. There was a lot of power in the old man’s swing, born of years of rowing and fueled by a father’s rage. Tony saw no regret on Mario’s face, only impatience and a grim determination to do whatever was necessary to protect his daughter.